Jelly-baby anyone? Dr Who free downloadable games announced

Posted by Helvetica | May 30, 2010

First, we started seeing results about Doctor Who games on a Games Blog on the Guardian. And here’s what we found:

The BBC has announced that it’ll be releasing four Doctor Who Adventure Games to tie in with the latest series of the hit sci-fi show. Mac and PC owners will be able to download each episode from the Doctor Who website, starting in June.

Following through we wandered our way into the BBC article “Doctor Who: The Adventure Games” and then, suddenly, amazement flooded.

Now this should catch our attention.

These four new adventures will take the form of free downloadable computer games available for PC and Mac, in which players assume control of the Doctor and Amy as they embark on new adventures which complement the new TV series.

Doctor

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Grand Theft Auto in the classroom?

Posted by Helvetica | April 18, 2010

UK Police and victim support groups have been putting together a curriculum that will give younger student’s at school a chance to declare a difference between the “real” and the “unreal” using clips and slides from video games. One game in particular is the controversial Grand Theft Auto series.
Stills from violent video game Grand Theft Auto are being used to teach primary school children about violence.

The 18-rated game is being used as part of a police-backed pilot scheme in primary schools in Merseyside to deter youngsters from aggressive behaviour.

Under the scheme, 10 and 11-year-olds are shown stills from the games, which allow players to beat up prostitutes.

These are used alongside real-life images to prompt a discussion on what is good, bad, real and unreal.
The article appears a bit terse in the department of child educational psychology (or totally lacking.) There’s certainly some commentary about children having short attention spans, but …

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Gaming Addiction Isn’t, Gamers Are Just Really Bored

Posted by Nelson Williams | November 26, 2008

The BBC reports that Europe’s gaming addiction clinic has discovered that roughly 90% of their gaming addiction patients aren’t addicted at all, at least in clinical terms. Instead, these gamers, who spend more then four hours a day playing games like World of Warcraft, simply find a sort of escape and social life inside games that overpowers their ability to socialize in the real world. The end result is the same; they disappear into games while their real life crumbles.

Socializing is a skill, and one that must be practiced. Kids and adults who avoid social activities, have few local friends, or have been bullied and picked on in realspace tend to turn toward video games as a life and experience away from the traumas and failure of the real world. With the advent of the internet, this phenomena is becoming more common. Hell, …

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